


Laws, Love and Crystal Balls

by chanyeoloving



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Chaptered, Fluff, M/M, Romance, Sexual Tension, Smut, fortune teller baekhyun, head detective chanyeol, single dad, slight angst, what else do i add
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 01:23:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20183929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chanyeoloving/pseuds/chanyeoloving
Summary: Byun Baekhyun is a fortune teller who believes in all things love and magical. Head detective Park Chanyeol would disagree. So what could go wrong?





	Laws, Love and Crystal Balls

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first chapter and I don't know how to start a story, I don't remember how to write, but hopefully you guys like it :3

“You will never marry.”

A loud gasp fills up the tiny room of a store, a cluttered shop that stands between a quaint bakery and a place that sells candles, shelves upon shelves of crystal stones, tarot cards and the odd dreamcatchers tied onto pins. Amidst it all, Jongin looks appalled. He glances at every corner of the room, located behind the main part of the store, behind the counter that has been left abandoned because Thursdays are the slowest days – no one ever really takes a look at the shop that’s covered in midnight blue paint and white stars. The room is barely concealed with strings of beads hanging from the doorway instead of a door, and Jongin thinks he can make a run for it. He knows he shouldn’t have stepped into _City Lights _on his lunch break.

“I-Impossible.”

“I’m afraid the stars have spoken.”

It’s whispered in a soft stone, almost muffled into the sleeve of a burgundy robe that reaches the floor, but Jongin gulps at the eyes staring at him, unblinking and droopy, calculating. He waits as Baekhyun presses his thin lips together before resting his elbows against the table, the tip of his chin in his palms. So, he begins to eye the earring dangling from Baekhyun’s right ear like it does every day, the charm a silver crescent moon, just like the dots of constellations drawn on his cheeks, faint and pretty, matching the reds on his eyelids and his dark hair. It isn’t until Baekhyun pointedly looks at the crystal ball placed in between them that Jongin stops bouncing his knees and clears his throat.

Only to be cut off by the fortune teller suddenly clapping his hands and leaning back in his seat.

“I wish things could be different--”

“Can you stop telling Jongin that he’s never going to get married.”

The curtains of beads float behind Kyungsoo as he walks into the back room with two cups of his coffee in his hands, blinking twice at the pout on Baekhyun’s face before he’s taking a seat on the single sofa pushed into the corner.

“Come on, Soo! It’s not my fault that your stupid husband here believes me in the first place.” The fortune teller starts to yell, gesturing towards a sheepish looking Jongin with his arms flying around and large eyes, teeth all bared as he continues to make noises that neither of them can comprehend.

But Hyunbee does as she pulls the hem of Baekhyun’s robe back and nuzzles her face into her father’s thigh, blabbering out words of her own as the fortune teller runs his fingers through the toddler’s hair. It brings a fond smile to Kyungsoo’s face and Jongin’s, too, before the baker from next door abruptly stands up from his seat and throws his hands above his head, exasperated.

“You just told me, your best friend, that he’s never going to get married!” Jongin complains.

With a wrinkle of his nose and Hyunbee’s arms wrapped around his calf, Baekhyun is momentarily confused until he’s looking up at the man in disbelief, “you’re already married, idiot! Crystal balls aren’t real, Nini. They aren’t real and-- and stop staring at me like that or I will chuck this crystal ball at your head. I do not care if Kyungsoo is here.”

And crystal balls aren’t. Not like they are in the movies where the sparks fly and the glass burns a soft blue colour, reading the futures of those who tremble in their seat and fiddle with their fingers. But nothing is deemed magical unless there’s a tiny room with shadows and one crystal ball, shining beautifully enough to distract the customers as they come in with high expectations. Nothing about _City Lights _is magical.

Except Byun Baekhyun and his hands.

With a touch that lasts no longer than five seconds, a person’s future is told. Sometimes it’s bleary, somewhat messy as sounds and emotions well up and start to become a blur. And sometimes it’s clear as sunlight, seen from the person’s perceptive as Baekhyun envisions five seconds of their future. He can describe people they’ve never met before; he can bring together years of one sided love, and he can see heartbreaks. The only thing he can’t do is tell whether his vision will take place in five weeks or five years. And it’s okay because no one ever really believes him, not until it happens and they come barging into his and Kyungsoo’s store, exclaiming how it was all true.

His mother had told him it’s a gift, still does as she visits him and Hyunbee on the weekends when the store is closed, when she misses her son and granddaughter. Baekhyun only nodded then, a little dazed, barely listening as she said it could bring him a lot of happiness, but it could also bring him a lot of grief.

When Kyungsoo had suggested Baekhyun to buy the empty store next to Jongin’s bakery a year ago, the fortune teller had leaped at the chance and pleaded his friend to run the magic shop with him. It bloomed at first, gathering customers who were just curious about the new shop in their mall, gazing at the antiques and crystals, marvelling at the small bulbs of coloured lights hanging from the ceiling. Then the regular customers came in – teenagers who loved all things spooky and mysterious, kids who believed that a board would help them communicate with the dead, and some women who just wanted to practise witchcraft in the corners of their living rooms. Baekhyun would listen to them, uncertain and a little nervous, as he’d ring up their items and send them off with a dazzling smile, wide, boxy and pretty.

And every few minutes he would glance behind the beaded curtains and see Hyunbee playing in her makeshift nursery, some toys Baekhyun had brought from home thrown around and some toys Jongin had insisted on buying from his favourite niece. It’s only towards the end of every day when the two year old would grow tired and distracted, dawdling out into the main store, asking Kyungsoo to carry her and they’d both watch Baekhyun talk to a customer in stutters and frantic movements.

Baekhyun’s voice is high, as it usually is when someone walks through the front door, after Jongin had gone back to his shift at the bakery and the last few customers were loitering around in the store. With his fingers pressed against his mouth, the elderly woman looks between the stack of cards in her hands and at the fortune teller in awe, listening as he exclaims, “These. _These. _Ma’am. I am- they’re too powerful to put into words. My senses… even my senses could not give you a more clear understanding of what your future might hold, but these tarot cards— oh, they will let you know exactly what your banana bread needs to beat Mrs Oh at the next community fair.”

A fortune teller isn’t a fortune teller without a few little fibs and realistic hopes.

“You want papa?” Kyungsoo asks after Baekhyun sends him a grin over his shoulder, pinching Hyunbee’s nose, button shaped and just like her father’s. He would always receive an eager nod in reply. “He’ll be finished soon and then Hyunbee can go home and have her banana milk, okay?”

“Uncle Soo want ‘nana milk?”

“I think Uncle Nini would.”

And outside the tiny, cluttered store, on the other side of the mall, is someone who the crystal ball would have never saw coming.

“Detectives can’t waste time buying cookies, Jongdae.”

“But ah,” the secretary stops mid step into the quiet mall that stands opposite _Parks & Parks_, shoes scuffling against the floor, holding up a finger that has the two tall men halting to a stop, “you’re a head detective, Yeol. You deserve a break every now and then to, you know, buy some cookies from the best bakery in town.”

“You just want to see Minseok.”

And even the grunt that follows as Park Chanyeol walks around his secretary and strolls past the softly lit shops, people still stop and stare and swoon. They blush and do double takes, at his blonde hair that’s styled perfectly to show off an undercut, uncommon and suave, at the furrow of his eyebrows while Jongdae’s whines grow louder, at his long legs that seem endless while his leather shoes tap against the marble floor of the mall. They also swoon when they see Park Sehun right behind them, nodding to himself, hands stuffed into the pockets of his slacks as he soon falls into step with Chanyeol.

The Park brothers, the head detectives of their own firm, on their break and looking for the bright pink bakery Jongdae won’t shut up about.

“I mean, if you’re not into cookies, or baked goods even because I don’t think you have a single sweet bone in your body—”

“Don’t you mean sweet tooth?” Sehun cuts in and asks, absentminded and far too focused on the Halloween decorations the mall has put up for the month to notice Jongdae’s face falling into a blank look.

“As I was saying. Chanyeol could visit that adorable little magic place right next to it. Yixing and Minseok know the owners; they say there’s a real fortune teller. I mean, they saw me in Minseok’s future and look at us now – we’re engaged. I still can’t believe it.”

“Or they saw you sending flowers to poor Minseok every single day until he agreed to go out with you.”

“Sehun, _Sir, _please shut up.”

The sound of shoes tapping against the floor soon become incessant, and it’s then when Sehun and Jongdae finally notice Chanyeol leaning against a wall, arms crossed over his chest and looking all sorts of irritated, gesturing for Jongdae to go in. He does with an excited yell and the bell above the door still rings long after he’s gone. The tall detective ignores Sehun and the raise of his eyebrows, only tightening the knot of his tie while he wordlessly waits for his secretary.

“You never step out of that stupid office of yours. This break will do you a favour, refresh your mind. Some even run out of their cubicles as soon as the clock hits twelve. Yet, here you are looking like you’re being held against your will.” Sehun speaks with an expected look on his face.

Chanyeol rolls his eyes, almond shaped and rimmed with red from sleepless nights, words gruff and coming out in a slur after spending the whole morning yelling over a case that doesn’t want to be solved, and his brother just doesn’t understand, “less hours in there means less hours working on our cases, Sehun. We have people depending on us to save them. Our firm provides the best services and it’s up to us to secure our future with the company.”

“You don’t—” and it’s with a flicker of his eyes when Sehun’s words trail off into a whisper and the younger Park is blinking up at the store next to them, narrowing his eyes as he reads the cursive writing imprinted on the front glass door, frosted windows nearby hiding away the inside of the shop. He sees it then – the words bold and neat, proposing to read your future if you buy anything from the store. A little stupid and unbelievable, and maybe a little whimsical, too.”

“How about reading your future right now?”

The older detective immediately blanches for a second or two, trailing after Sehun who begins to tap a finger against the sign held up on one of the frosted windows. They miss the owl-eyed man staring at them through the front door, his own eyes speculative as he slowly opens the entrance and goes unnoticed by the two tall men.

“Are you stupid as Jongdae?” Chanyeol snaps, but he finds himself walking around his brother to scrutinise the sign and the neat rows of stars painted around the name, “Those- what are they called – psychics? Do you think some weirdo can look into a ball made out of nothing but glass and tell me my future. They’re nothing but frauds. We know this—”

“Aren’t you exaggerating a little?”

The two detectives whip their heads around at an unfamiliar voice, finding a shorter man standing at the entrance of the store, blocking them from seeing what’s inside. It sends a chill down Sehun’ spine as he briefly glances at his older brother, only to see an angry frown. The step he takes to inch closer to the bakery goes unnoticed, but he soon finds himself squealing when Chanyeol walks towards the strange man. It’s silent for a few seconds, even the hallways where a few customers linger around and the laughs coming from the nearby stores are hushed. Until the door is opened wider and they’re being told to come into _City Lights_.

“I didn’t mean to overhear your conversation, but you were talking fairly loudly,” the man starts to explain, walking through rows upon rows, seemingly looking for something as he doesn’t stop to check if Chanyeol and Sehun have decided to follow him, “my name is Kyungsoo and I am the co-owner of this store. And we don’t just look into crystal balls here like some people think. No, our _Byul_ is something special and he can most definitely tell you your future.”

“Byul?”

Without another word, Chanyeol steps further into the store and walks past the front counter, into curtains made out of colourful beads, and into a room where the lights seem dimmed and the place seems stuffy. He doesn’t pay any heed to Sehun’s gasp at the sight of little bulbs shining bright on the ceilings or at the velvet sheets hanging from corner to corner. Instead, Chanyeol arches an eyebrow up at the man sitting behind the desk, watches while he has his hands clasped together, eyes closed and a low hum running out through his thin lips. Kyungsoo holds up a hand, asking them to wait, but Chanyeol’s still gazing at the unnamed man, almond eyes flickering from his dangling earrings to the dots of paint of his face, to his nose that wrinkles when he senses other people in the room.

This must be Byul.

_Pretty, _Chanyeol thinks.

_Pretty weird._

When the fortune teller suddenly unclasped his hands – that seem pretty, too, with long fingers and a mole standing dark against his pale skin – and reached out, his eyes that are lined with soft hues of red still closed, Kyungsoo ushers Sehun to take a seat. The younger man starts to frantically shake his head, taking a few steps back until he’s halfway out of the room and under the beaded curtains. Chanyeol soon scoffs at this and takes two strides without thinking, until he’s sitting down behind the crystal ball and the man who has yet to open his eyes as if he’s waiting for something else.

“He can’t look at your face before he does it,” Kyungsoo explains, voice serious and hushed, and Chanyeol wants to laugh because it’s nonsense. It must be. “Place your hands in his and hold on. He will see five seconds of your future through your eyes, be it something that takes place two weeks from now or possibly two decades. Then you interpret it as you wish.”

“Am I supposed to believe in any of this?” Chanyeol asks, slightly baffled, questioning how he got roped into this whole ordeal when he should be back in his office working on cases for upcoming trails.

“That is up to you.”

However, Chanyeol simply stares, wondering what incredulous stories this fortune teller could possibly come up with. He wonders and starts to notice the smaller man’s lips starting to tremble, growing impatient as he keeps his hands on the table, as his eyes almost flutter open like he’s ready to explode, whether in annoyance or pure joy – Chanyeol doesn’t know. But he stares like he’s amused, and he doesn’t notice the pull of his own lips, so he heaves a sigh and takes a hold of the hands in front of his.

Nothing could go wrong.

It’s then when Baekhyun feels warm hands in his slightly trembling ones, feels the callouses of the man’s fingers and palms against his own soft skin, bigger than his, _older_ than his. And his eyes squeeze shut as his skin starts to sting and something starts to throb painfully at the back of his head. It’s something he never felt. But the thought of this never happening before is pushed away and he only grips the man’s hands harder.

Then he sees it.

_He sees hands, big and slightly tanned, fingertips and palms a little rough. This must be the man’s hands. They look nice, prettier with the silver rings adorning them, entranced as they twinkle. He follows them, sees them reaching up for something, probably a lover, a soulmate, someone who Baekhyun knows is important. He sees them cupping a face so tenderly, like he’s fond and in love, and the fortune teller almost blushes because this vision is about love. _

_Five seconds, short and special, but could last an eternity. And when it’s about love, it can be the most beautiful thing, Baekhyun thinks. Because he knows despite the rough hands, the reluctance to believe that maybe magic can exist, the hushed and less than happy words coming from the man who is sitting in his front of him with his hands in his, Baekhyun can feel the love pouring out of him. For this person._

_So, he sees a pair of pink lips with a familiar cupid’s bow turning to kiss the man’s wrist. He sees it turn into a wide smile, rectangular and bright._

_And then he sees himself._

_Droopy eyes, painted stars and Hyunbee by his side._

_“I love you, Byun Baekhyun.”_


End file.
